Search Results for: Nigeria

BY KEITH NUTHALL

BIRD flu has reached Africa, the Office International des Épizooties (OIE), the world animal health organisation, has confirmed, citing an outbreak in Kaduna state, northern Nigeria involving 46,000 cases. The news poses a dismal outlook for efforts to contain the disease given sub-Saharan Africa’s shambolic regulatory and veterinary controls, and international health workers will inevitably fear the worst.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

FURTHER global restrictions on the tobacco industry are to be developed, the first Conference of the Parties to the World Health Organisation (WHO) Framework Convention on Tobacco Control has decided. Meeting in Geneva, Switzerland, diplomats established working groups to develop legally binding protocols, using the convention as their authority, that further limit cross-border tobacco advertising and smuggling.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL

THE WORLD’S senior anti-money laundering body, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is to focus on Africa, following a meeting of the international organisation, in Cape Town last week. FATF members approved a strategy where its officials and those of the Eastern and Southern Africa Money Laundering Group "work together more aggressively to combat money laundering and terrorist financing in the region".…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
SATELLITE images of the shrinking Aral Sea in central Asia have long horrified environmentalists, but now similar creeping disasters are threatening the many fresh water and brackish lakes of Africa. These are illustrated by disturbing satellite images within an atlas produced by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).…

BY MONICA DOBIE
AN ENVIRONMENTAL organisation has blamed American businesses for dodging safe, but costly recycling methods for their used computer equipment by shipping them to developing countries in an insincere show of philanthropy, which actually causes severe environmental damage.

A report called ‘The Digital Dump: Exporting Reuse and Abuse to Africa,’ written by the Seattle-based Basel Action Network, says the bulk of used computer equipment sent from the United States to developing countries for use in homes, schools and businesses is often neither usable nor repairable.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
SATELLITE images of the shrinking Aral Sea in central Asia have long horrified environmentalists, but now similar creeping disasters are threatening the many fresh water and brackish lakes of Africa. These are illustrated by disturbing satellite images within an atlas produced by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
A WELL-FINANCED international programme to remove stocks of obsolete pesticides from Africa has been launched, protecting communities from persistent organic pollutants. The first phase of the Africa Stockpiles Programme (ASP-P1) has now been approved by the World Bank, the Global Environment Facility (GEF), and the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
INTERNATIONAL Atomic Energy Agency director general Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei has visited Nigeria and Ghana to see how his UN agency has been installing radiotherapy units in local hospitals.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE SEPTEMBER 11 attacks sparked a tightening of security restrictions around the world and the shipping industry has been a key focus. The latest initiative is the creation of a global system of biometric identifiers for seafarers. Keith Nuthall reports.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE UNITED Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) is sending legal and accounting specialists to Nigeria and Kenya, to help them trace and recover money stolen by previous corrupt governments. The agency will “conduct in-depth assessments of (their) institutional and legal frameworks”, making detailed proposals to “overcome obstacles to asset recovery”.…